The narrative style of Hatim’s Tales

 

This paper will use a standard conception of narrative structure (Labov & Waletzky 1967 & Labov 1989) to analyze the stories of Hatim’s Tales (Stein 1923), in order to comment on the specific genre of oral narrative they represent.

The tales are an ingenious mix of the simple and the profound. They are simple in the pure entertainment value of the scenarios they depict, and profound in the way these are exploited for deep contemplation on human nature and our common human failings. The style of narration appears to support these contradictory rhetorical objectives.

Key features of the narrative design are used to serve this end: For example, the tales give little attention to the story orientation; in particular, there is little to no character development. The absence of a well-articulated particularization of experience is interpretable as rendering the depiction as essentially superficial, and therefore no more than entertaining. Yet, it is, at the same time, arguably, representing our common human experience, and is, hence, thought-provoking. The inherent ambiguity seems to be deliberate. It is evident in other features of the narrative design. The tales move at a rapid pace, via high-content events, and with accompanying evaluative commentary in small amounts and at only key narrative points. There is, in consequence, high action-drama, with little commentary to detract from it. Yet, the limited amount of the evaluative commentary also gives this commentary special saliency, and draws attention to it as signaling key narrative points, and giving them clarity and significance; it is poignant in part because it comes in small bites. Interestingly, a defining type of evaluative commentary in the tales is the poetic verbalization of a moral dictum; again, fashioned, by its intrinsic character, to entertain and inform at one and the same time.

This paper will examine these and other features of their narrative design to suggest how Hatim’s Tales represent the inherently complex in the guise of the compellingly simple. The craftsmanship of this storyteller is evident in the defining features of his narrative style that serve specifically to facilitate this objective.